WASHINGTON — Judging from her emails, Jill Kelley was star-struck by the big-name military commanders rotating between the war zones in the Middle East and her home town of Tampa, Florida. And they were equally smitten with her.
“Everyone thinks you’re a RockStar!” Kelley gushed in a 2012 email to Marine Gen. James Mattis, then commander of all U.S. military forces in the Middle East. “We agreed how amazing it must be that you’re single-handedly re-writing history,” she added, recalling how she had sung the general’s praises to several foreign ambassadors at the Republican National Convention that August in Tampa.
After another social event, she wrote a similar mash note to Mattis’s deputy, Vice Adm. Robert Harward. “What a Leader you were to these heads of State,” she enthused. “You ROCK!!!”
Replied Harward: “YOU ROCK MORE!”
In late 2012, Kelley’s talent as a Tampa hostess and her knack for charming men in uniform indirectly triggered one of the most embarrassing national security scandals of the past decade. Among other casualties, the fallout led to the forced resignation of CIA Director David Petraeus – a former four-star Army general – and the early retirement of Marine Gen. John Allen, the commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.
Kelley’s chumminess with Petraeus and the military brass had attracted the notice of the spymaster’s biographer and mistress, Paula Broadwell. She bad-mouthed Kelley in anonymous emails to military officials and others, according to federal investigators and a lawsuit filed by Kelley. The FBI got involved. Petraeus quit in disgrace. Allen retired.
The case still has not been entirely resolved. The Justice Department is deciding whether to charge Petraeus with leaking classified material to his lover. He has denied doing so.
Long after the scandal broke, it remains unclear what exactly prompted Broadwell to view Kelley as a rival. Kelley has said the two never met and that she never had an affair with Petraeus, Allen or anyone else.
Nor has anyone fully explained why Allen, while busy overseeing the war in Afghanistan, exchanged a blizzard of correspondence with Kelley – between 20,000 and 30,000 pages of emails, according to some senior defense officials. Other officials have said that figure includes many duplicate notes and exaggerates the extent of their communications, adding that there were only about 300 total emails.
The Defense Department inspector general investigated and concluded in 2013 that Allen had not committed any wrongdoing. But it has kept its report and all of Allen’s emails under lock and key.
Now, a glimpse into Kelley’s relationship with military commanders has emerged from another, previously undisclosed batch of emails: her correspondence with Mattis, a legendary Marine, and Harward, a Navy SEAL, from when they served as the top two officers at U.S. Central Command headquarters in Tampa. The Washington Post requested the emails in November 2012 under the Freedom of Information Act. More than two years later, after numerous unexplained delays, the Pentagon released 238 pages of heavily censored documents.
The unredacted portions of the emails – from Mattis’s and Harward’s government email accounts – contain no evidence of improper behavior. But taken together, the records depict two wartime commanders who were easy marks for the flattery of an exuberant socialite. “I wish that we could clone a couple thousand of you, but the land is likely not ready for that big an impact,” Mattis told Kelley in a Jan. 31, 2012, email.
Mattis and Harward, who have since retired from the military, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Kelley, 39, who still lives in Tampa, referred questions to her attorney, Alan Raul of Washington. He released a statement that read, in part: “The latest set of emails made public by the government simply confirms that Jill Kelley is and was a talented, civic-minded woman doing productive work as Honorary Ambassador to Central Command in Tampa and as Honorary Consul for the Republic of Korea.”
Reading this article I see nothing really scandalous with this emails. For those wondering how Kelley became the Honorary Consul to South Korea here is how it happened:
In January 2012, for example, the South Korean Embassy in Washington informed Kelley that she had been selected to become an honorary consul. Even though she knew little about the country, she accepted the title with gusto.
“YES!!!! Honorary Consul General. I’m soooooo excited about the humbling honor,” she wrote to Mattis on Jan. 31 to inform him of her appointment. “It’s ironic that I get the request from the state of Korea – which is NOT my expertise. However as a lover of International Politics/Foreign Affairs, I do find the Korean Statehood quite interesting . . . (I’m a lover of conflict problem solving, and have a keen sense of seeking opportunities in chaos.).”
While Kelley’s appointments as ambassador and consul general were honorary positions, the emails indicate she was eager to become a diplomatic player.
I would have to believe that she was picked by South Korea simply because of her connections to top US military leaders in CENTCOM. Maybe the South Korean intelligence figured she was some good to collect information from simply from letting her talk because she obviously liked talking.
The real scandal out of all of this is why are all these top generals in CENTCOM hanging around with some like this?
